Estoy viva, the recent exhibition of works by Regina José Galindo (Guatemala City, 1974) curated by Diego Sileo and Eugenio Viola for Milan’s PAC Contemporary Art Pavilion, seems (to me) to pay specific attention to the resistance of today’s humanity, its fragile texture, ruthless topia [1], its being and insistent programme of rebirth and social payback. But also the redemption of a land – a wide territory – that dissipated its children to aid a planetary process which, in some cases, frightens, alarms and horrifies the mind. Galindo has always created counter images or processes that aim to short circuit the corrupt flow of everyday life to explore «the ethical implications of social injustice in relation to racial and sexual discrimination» or an entire series of «other abuse linked to unequal relationships of power holding up today’s societies»[2]. From life to death, from slavery to freedom, from the erosion of eroticism to the heroism of heresy, from social to political, from ethics to aesthetics, its victory is a mute and silent one that presses the buttons of indifference to shake up society’s nervous system.
The exhibition is split up into six sections: Donna | Woman | Mujer, Organico | Organic | Orgánico, Violenza | Violence | Violencia, Politica | Politics | Política, Morte | Death | Muerte, Poesie | Poems | Poesías that draw a precise route through which one can savour the variations of a striking work that sacralises and desacralises, that places the artist in the middle of a sacrificial folder (as defined by Viola in reference to Gans)[3], of a «conceived act» or «as a necessary rite of passage» for the construction of linguistic passages that fluctuate from sacred to profane[4].
«I am commonplace/like the echo of voices/the face of the moon./I have two tits/ – small -/ a long nose/ normal height./ Near-sighted/ not well-spoken/ flabby buttocks/orange peel./ I stand in front of the mirror/ and I masturbate./ I am a woman/ the most commonplace/ among commonplace women»[5], states the artist in one of her poems. Almost as if to indicate her being a woman and accentuating a visual field for the purpose of reallocating the Mujer (and redefine her role) in the world.
Regina José Galindo. Estoy Viva, a cura di Diego Sileo e Eugenio Viola, 25.03 – 08.06.2014, PAC – Padiglione Arte Contemporanea, MilanoSileo suggests that «through her work we get the feeling of participating in a game of invisible forces that escape historical or sociological examination because they capture heterological issues and phenomena to then hurl them against anything showing resistance […]» [6]. In fact, this is a process that investigates the past and transforms things on purpose to probe and unhinge Puritanism to totally reveal reality and to progressively build an individual interpretation of contemporary history filtered through the confession[7] and scorching re-materialization[8] of individual pain and society’s torment.
Regina José Galindo. Estoy Viva, curated by Diego Sileo and Eugenio Viola, 25.03 – 08.06.2014, PAC – Padiglione Arte Contemporanea, Milan, Italy.
[1] Cfr. M. Foucault, Les hétérotopies / Les corps utopique, Institut National de l’audiovisual, Paris 2004.
[2] D. Sileo, E. Viola, edited for, Regina José Galindo, op.cit., page 218.
[3] E. L. Gans, Sacrificing Culture, in «Chronicle», n. 184, 1999.
[4] E. Viola, L’estetica sacrificale di Regina José Galindo, in D. Sileo, E. Viola, edited for, Regina José Galindo, op.cit., page 24.
[5] R. J. Galindo, Poesie | Poems | Poesías, in D. Sileo, E. Viola, edited for, Regina José Galindo. Estoy viva, catalogue of the exhibition held at PAC – Padiglione Arte Contemporanea in Milan from 25 March to 8 June 2014, Skira, Milan 2014, page 214.
[6] D. Sileo, Regina José Galindo. Necropotere, in D. Sileo, E. Viola, edited for, Regina José Galindo, op.cit., page 12.
[7] A. Acevedo, La Performance, in Pasos a desnivel. Mapa urbano de la cultura contemporánea en Guatemala, La Curandería, Guatemala 2003, page 69.
[8] C. Carolin, Depués de lo digital rematerializamos distancia y violencia en el trabajo de Regina José Galindo, in «Third Text», v. 25, a. 2, n. 109. Now available in Regina José Galindo, edited by the prometeogallery of Ida Pisani, Silvana Editoriale, Milan 2011, pages. 36-37.
Images
(cover), Regina José Galindo, PIEDRA, 2013, Sao Paulo, Brasil, photo by Julio Pantoja / Marlene Ramirez-Cancio, commissioned and produced by Octavo Encuentro Hemisférico del Centro de Estudios de Arte y Política, courtesy of the artist and of PrometeoGallery (Milan) (1) Regina José Galindo, CAPARAZÓN, 2010, corpus, art in action, MADRE Museum, Naples, Italy, photo by Amedeo Benestante, courtesy of the artist and of PrometeoGallery (Milan) (2) Regina José Galindo, HILO DE TIEMPO, 2012, San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, Messico, photo by David Pérez / Jorge Linares, commissioned by Centro Hemisférico de Performance y Política in Chiapas and EDELO casa de arte en movimiento y residencia intercultural, courtesy of the artist and of PrometeoGallery (Milan).
